JUST THE AXE, MA'AM #13
A Monthly Curated Newsletter of New & Notable Sword & Sorcery
INTRODUCTION: ONE YEAR LATER…
On August 28, 2023, I made a snap decision to do this newsletter.
That entire month was turning out to be a significant month for new Sword & Sorcery, ranging from the release of Howard Andrew Jones’ Lord of a Shattered Land to the release of several issues of various Sword & Sorcery magazines that had been starting up over the past few years.
Yet, simultaneously, the conversation broke out within the community over concerns that there was a “Glut” of new Sword & Sorcery and that perhaps the audience as we knew it a year ago was not large enough to support it.
Those concerns are understandable in retrospect. Many people had put in great effort to create a small but stable community, and by then, it became undisputable all the new Sword & Sorcery works coming out from outside the community that the ground was shifting beneath one’s feet.
I had faith that there were new readers out there, but it did strike me that there was no reliably updated central resource for those new readers who were hearing about the revival, not knowing where to start or why particular new works mattered.
Just The Axe, Ma’am, was born that day, and over the past year, I have profiled many works that I am excited to see in Sword & Sorcery. Even more works have come out, and the audience has verifiably turned out to be larger than what was first imagined.
In short, the Glut is here, the Glut is growing, the Glut is good for the betterment of current Sword & Sorcery, and I am so happy to be a front-row spectator and report on it here.
I hope you’ve been enjoying these past few months, I look forward to a second year of bringing you new and notable Sword & Sorcery.
Speaking of which…
THIS MONTH’S NEWS & UPDATES
+ Stephen Kostywych is the editor of The Year’s Best Canadian Fantasy & Science Fiction and has released the Table of Contents for the second volume of the Best of 2023, and “Revelstoke” by Gemma Files was selected as one of the stories.
”Revelstoke” first appeared in issue 2 of New Edge Sword & Sorcery. It is a story about a mercenary company that discovers dark magic and one strange pelican in the town of the same name.
It is the first story to come out during the current Sword & Sorcery revival to receive such an accolade!
Other Canadian authors listed in the Table of Contents who have contributed to the Sword & Sorcery revival are Silvia Moreno Garcia (the novella Return of the Sorceress), Chadwick Ginther (Shared World and Khyber) and Premee Mohammed (story in the forthcoming New Edge Sword & Sorcery #3)
+ Brackenbury Books has released one cover image to promote their upcoming crowdfunding project: Double-Edged Books featuring the same two-books-in-one format with alternate covers you can flip to read as the famous Ace Double Science Fiction paperbacks of the 1960s.
The books for this project are Waste Flowers by Bryn Hammond and The Walls of Shira Yulun by Dariel R. A. Quiogue. Both are thematically linked, exploring their characters and settings modelled after a fantasy version of Mongolian culture during Genghis Khan's reign.
You can click here for notifications when it goes live.
+ David Agranoff has initiated a movement to create a memorial plaque for C.L. Moore on the site that once had The Fletcher Trust Bank on it, where she worked and where she wrote her stories after hours on the bank office typewriter.
He has already gained the signatures and support of authors such as Laird Barron, Brian Keene, Alec Nevala-Lee, Mary Sangiovanni, John Shirley, F. Paul Wilson, and others.
You can find out more and sign the petition at this link at Amazing Stories.
+ RIP Janet Morris (May 25, 1946 - August 10, 2024)
Janet Morris became famous for her far-future series, which began with The High Couch of Silistra in 1977 and continued with three more novels.
However, for Sword & Sorcery fans of a certain age, we first encountered her stories within the shared world anthology series Thieves’ World, where her fan-favourite character Tempus Thales, a moody long-lived mercenary antihero with a mysterious past who can heal from any wound, took over the group narrative of the series for a while, much like over at Marvel Comics, fan favourite Wolverine, the similar moody long-lived mutant antihero with a mysterious past who can heal from any wound took over the group narrative of The X-Men.
Tempus became such a breakaway success that he starred in Morris's solo trilogy (Beyond Sanctuary/Beyond Wizardwall/Beyond the Veil) and had his Thieves’ World stories collected in a solo effort from Baen Books. Morris, with her husband Chris, then wrote another trilogy of books featuring the character.
At the same time, in the mid-80s, she launched a Shared World series of her own, Heroes in Hell, in which pre-Christian figures of historical and mythical stature waged war against each other in an Infernal Afterlife.
During the second Tempus trilogy, she and her husband withdrew from writing to concentrate on a number of military advisory capacities for the U.S. Global Security Council specializing in nonlethal warfare applications, she and her husband founded M2 Technologies in 1995, which further subsumed her time.
She returned to writing in the early 2010s with relaunches of her Heroes in Hell series, new novels featuring Tempus and his companion Niko, and preferred editions of her Silustra series.
Her and fellow women authors like Tanith Lee and Morris’ occasional collaborator C. J Cherryh did much to make me think of Sword & Sorcery as something written as much by women as by men. As a kid, reading about Tempus and his Sacred Band of Mercenaries in the Gay Panic of the 1980s first planted in me the idea that you could be a total badass and homosexual at the same time.
Charles Gramlich writes a more personal memoir of her contributions to the genre at Black Gate with even more stunning paperback cover art of the era, which you can read here.
+ Novella publication is starting to rise in Sword & Sorcery fiction, with Spiral Tower Press’s release of Matt Holder’s novella Hurled Headlong Flaming earlier this year, the upcoming Brackenbury Books crowdfunding for the Double-Edged Sword & Sorcery imprint, and Old Moon Quarterly just announced a novella from Graham Thomas Wilcox set for a Halloween publication date (see below for more details).
In the meantime, G. W. Thomas, whose scholarship fuels the excellent Dark Worlds Quarterly site, has released Swords of Fire 3, a collection of short novels and novellas with an amusing introduction and a link to a survey of the ideal length of a Sword & Sorcery tale. This debate rages to this very day.
+ Scott Oden has started a new Discord server devoted to his interest in Historical Fiction set in the Ancient World. He is initiating the Self-Published Ancient Historical Blog Off in the Self-Published Fantasy Blog Off tradition (he has received the blessing to go ahead from SPFBO founder Mark Lawrence). Learn more about what he has planned and who gets involved in the upcoming reviews at his blog entry here.
+ Tim Waggoner, in his newsletter, announced the following:
The San Diego Comic-Con conference panel had them saying Titan wanted more ties to the Black Stone storyline. It sounds like they're trying to keep things self-contained even with the connections, but I can't confirm this without having read any of the Black Stone stories.
Speaking of Conan…
COMICS & GRAPHIC NOVELS
+ Shawn Curley has been doing a great job for Heroic Signatures, lining up interesting reviews and video essays for the official Conan the Barbarian channel, and this month, he has a terrific interview with comic book artist Doug Braithwaite that is well worth a listen.
(Coincidentally, while looking for his full name, I found out Curley had the tables turned on him and was interviewed this month at WorldatWarComics, which you can listen to here. For those curious about the behind-the-scenes of running the Conan channel.)
+ Aaron DiDonato (aka Captain Corum) hepped me to this update about the Red Sonja movie that is tucked into the Dynamite Dispatch column of recent issues of Red Sonja #12 and Red Sonja: Empire of the Damned #4.
Writer Luke Lieberman is listed as a Producer of the movie. While being interviewed over the fact he is going to be scripting the upcoming miniseries Red Sonja: Death and the Devil, he gave this update:
”Believe me, no one wants the movie finished more than me. I can certainly see the light at the end of the tunnel now with the digital effects in full swing and our composer recording the score. I don’t see the movie having any effect on my writing of Sonja because my relationship long predates the film, and the movie long predates the film, and the movie tells a unique and original tale.”
The upcoming movie is directed by M.J. Bassett (Solomon Kane movie, Eden Lake, episodes of Ash vs. Evil Dead) and stars Matilda Lutz (Revenge)
+ Simon Underwood has been contributing a ton of eye-catching fantasy art to RPGs and magazines but has now released the graphic novel Gargantuan. As per the plot description on the website:
A great beast has arisen from the sea. Queen Pharseia and her closest allies stand in their way. GARGANTUAN: a graphic novel written and drawn by Simon Underwood. For fans of kaiju, sword and sorcery, and existential dread.
FILM & TELEVISION
+ The Bad Movie Bible is hands down one of the best YouTube channels for trash cinema today. It does excellent in-depth surveys of B-movies worldwide, presented with slick editing and droll yet informative narration. I am always discovering new films in every video he does.
This month, they dropped this look at “Conansploitation.” You will not find a better look at the 80s B-movie Barbarian Boom (and its last remnants in the '90s) on the internet than this. After all, most others would not give shoutouts to Andre Norton and Charles R. Saunders, along with Robert E. Howard and Frank Frazetta.
INTERVIEWS & PANELS
+ Emporium of the Weird interviews Matt John regarding his new Sword & Sorcery fiction collection, To Walk on Worlds.
+ From Gencon 2024, authors S. E. Lindberg, Matthew John, Howard Andrew Jones, Jason Ray Carney and Dedren Snead discuss the current state of Sword & Sorcery.
MUSIC
+ New Edge Sword & Sorcery Magazine for Dungeon Synth Sunday promoted Fare Thee Well Battle Winds by Fen Walker. Earlier this year, the artist performed live at the New Edge Sword & Sorcery 2024 wrap party for their crowdfunding.
You can listen to it on Bandcamp here.
PODCASTS ON PARADE
+ The CromCast looks at the classic Sword & Sorcery novel Elric of Melnibone by Michael Moorcock. You can listen to part one of their in-depth look at this link.
+ New Edge Sword & Sorcery Story Chat returns with a look at a story from the current Profane Altars anthology. “Never Threaten a Spider” by Sara Century. Sitting in with New Edge Sword & Sorcery magazine publisher Oliver Brackenbury, Hurled Headlong Flaming author Matt Holder, Beating Hearts & Battle Axes editor Jay Wolf, and, uh, some guy named Kevin Beckett who puts out a newsletter called Just The Axe, Ma’am.
The story allows discussion of Soviet horror films, what is truly Weird in classic Sword & Sorcery, and the symbolism of rabbits. Listen to the stream here.
+ Rogues in the House return, not with their promised look at the Beastmaster movie, alas, but with a potpourri of Sword & Sorcery news to discuss.
+ Last month, as part of the crowdfunding for the anthology Beating Hearts & Battle Axes, Oliver Brackenbury and Jay Wolf did a live stream discussing being editors and the editing process. It is now available in podcast form on Oliver’s show So I’m Writing a Novel.
REVIEWS
+ Over at Horror DNA, film reviewer Stephen McClurg looks at She is Conann. How can you resist a review's opening line like this?
"Though Bertrand Mandico’s She Is Conann defies genre and gender, at its bleeding and tinsel-wrapped heart, it’s a perverse hero’s journey, a paganistic purgatorio."
In an interesting bit of synchronicity, the same evening the New Edge Sword & Sorcery Story Chat recorded their look at Sara Century’s “Never Trust a Spider” Bobby Derie reviewed the same story at his blog Deep Cuts in a Lovecraftian Vein:
”On deeper consideration, however, this almost by-the-numbers S&S tale is anything but. It is a subtle subversion of expectations: a swordswoman who loses her sword early on. A thief who doesn’t really want to steal anything, and ultimately doesn’t. A hardboiled protagonist saved by a cute little bunny rabbit.”
Robin Marx has two Sword & Sorcery-related reviews this month in Grimdark Magazine. First up is John C. Hocking’s Two-book omnibus Conan and the City of the Dead:
”Conan: City of the Dead delivers the sort of blood and thunder that sword & sorcery readers expect. Both collected books share relentless pacing, frequent and savage combat, and plentiful horrific elements. Where Conan and the Emerald Lotus features significant moments of cosmic horror—fans of the Cthulhu Mythos will recognize references in the mystical language intoned by the book’s sorcerers— Conan and the Living Plague leans especially hard on the otherworldly terror. The Living Plague is rendered in an intensely creepy and alien manner, and—as Conan is dismayed to learn—it’s not the worst thing lurking beyond the stars.”
Then, Robin Marx looks at Matthew John’s Sword & Sorcery collection To Walk on Worlds.
”The stories in To Walk on Worlds are grim, brutal, horrific, and bleak but also contain flashes of wonder and even humor. As strong a debut collection as this is, To Walk on Worlds also gives readers a sense that Matthew John is just getting started. Just remember: wizards are dicks.”
+ Also at Grimdark, Carrie Chi Lough reviews Times Never Change, the second volume in John R Fultz’s Scaleborn universe.
“John R. Fultz showcases the range of his writing ability in Times Never Change. While faithful to its sword and sorcery spirit, the second book of The Scaleborn series swaps some barbarian-esque elements with full scale brutality.”
+ Logan Whitney from Rogues in the House Podcast reviews the collection To Walk On Worlds by Matt John, his partner in crime for the Podcast. Where else will you find such quotes as:
”TO WALK ON WORLDS is a unique and wonderful addition to the growing library of Contemporary Sword & Sorcery. It may even be among the very best there is. Just be glad you don't have to share air time with the author. This is going to inflate his ego beyond control.”
THIS MONTH IN SWORD & SORCERY MAGAZINES
+ AMRA: A venerable Sword & Sorcery magazine returns! It is being revived as Volume 3 at Wildside Press, to be edited by Wildside founder John Betancourt.
The magazine is named after a pseudonym that Conan the Barbarian used while operating as a pirate in Robert E. Howard's story “Queen of the Black Coast.”
While there existed a fanzine of the same name in 1955, the best-known version of the AMRA fanzine was the version that existed from 1959 - 1982, which much of the conversation and debate over what would prove to be the Second Wave of Sword & Sorcery occurred, with many authors (among them Poul Anderson, Leigh Brackett, Lin Carter, Buck Coulson, L. Sprague de Camp, Harry Harrison, Frank Herbert, Fritz Leiber, Jerry Pournelle, and Roger Zelazny) contributing articles, reviews, criticism, and poetry.
This new version will be published only annually and has solicited potential contributors. One confirmed is Steve Dilks, whose story “Devil-Gods of Akhadan” will be featured in the issue.
It's still early in reviving it, but this is important enough that we’re excited to see what happens next.
BENEATH CEASELESS SKIES:
+ Jon Olfert has a new Sword & Sorcery story in this issue! You can read “One Ear Left Over” at this link.
+ Galaxy Science Fiction Magazine has returned, and one of the stories is Sword & Sorcery with “The Barrow King” by Christopher Ruocchio. You can read the entire issue in PDF form at this link.
HEROIC FANTASY QUARTERLY:
Issue #61 is now out for your free online reading pleasure, and the contents are:
”The Wailing Keep” by Tim Hanlon
”The Physician’s Tale” by Jonathan Duckworth
”The Scepter of Aram Nahzar”, by Dariel R. A. Quiogue
Plus the poems:
”The Latest Attempt”, by Devan Barlow
”The Elder’s Lullaby”, by Ngô Bình Anh Khoa
And another page in Gary McCluskey’s ongoing comic book adaptation of “Spear and Fang” by Robert E. Howard.
You Can Read The Full Issue #61 Here.
If you are interested in their Patreon, click here.
NEW EDGE SWORD & SORCERY:
+ Issue 3 of New Edge Sword and Sorcery is available for pre-order. Featuring new stories from Premee Mohamed, Matthew John, John R. Fultz, and a brand new story by Molly Tanzer featuring Jirel of Joiry, the first Sword & Sorcery heroine, created by C. L. Moore.
As always, you can try their free issue #0 here.
OLD MOON QUARTERLY: Informed their Mailing List that work continues to release issue #7 within early September. In the meantime, they released the above art preview by Patrick Zircher for a Laird Barron story in the upcoming issue #8, "Now I Have the Scent." set in his Antiquity setting.
They have also revealed they will publish their first novella on October 31!
The publisher describes Graham Thomas Wilcox's Contra Amatores Mundi as “if Dark Souls were brewed in a big cauldron of Gene Wolfe, Cormac McCarthy, and Chretien de Troyes.” Though not fully illustrated, the book will have a few small spot illustrations by Mark Jarrell (which the publisher promises will also be issued as stickers!)
EDIT: Thank you for the corrected information, Old Moon!
+ Profane Sorcery is a special one-off zine from Weirdpunk Books that is “a spiritual companion to Profane Altars,” their anthology of Weird Sword & Sorcery they released in June. Featuring three more stories where Sword & Sorcery and Cosmic Horror meet.
You can order the zine right here.
SWORDS & SORCERY MAGAZINE: This month’s issue promises “Stories for the Journey,” according to editor Curtis Ellett.
“The Scarecrow of Terryk Head,” by Rab Foster
“The Hunger in the Dark” by Matthew X. Gomez,
“A Simple Job,” by Josh Howard,
plus the essay:
“A Told Tale by an Idiot: Westley v. Inigo versus Dumbledore v. Voldemort,” by Norman Grey, Esq.,
All three stories and the essay are free to read online, but if you enjoy the magazine, consider supporting it on Patreon.
TALES FROM THE MAGICIAN’S SKULL:
The Kickstarter set up by the magazine’s new owners, Outland Entertainment, is not active yet; this will be for issues 13 and onwards.
Click here to be notified when it goes live.
TRIAPA:
Issue #12 was released on August 1st, and the following authors contributed a 2-page amateur zine.
Ben Gardiner, Caliginous Chronicles, Vol 1
Andy Darby, Because the Bastards Won’t Write Themselves, Issue 3
Sage, Dibs
Jon Olfert, Cave Scrawl
Black Cavalier Designs, 12 Leagues To Averoigne Vol 1, Issue 12
Jason Donaldson, The House Half Under a Hill, August 2024
David J. Lynch, Ink and Hatchet: Musings on Larger than Life Fiction (August 2024, Issue 12)
Rom Parsons, Brazen Blades, Issue 4
Aaron Cummins, Views from the Pig Sty, August 2024
Neil Willcox, Solar Orbit Cinderella, Issue 2
Matt Holder, Pandemonizine, Vol 2 (August 2024) Issue 11
Carl Ellis, Tales from the Valley IX
TRIAPA is an Amateur Press Association founded by Spiral Tower Press, the people behind the Amateur Zines Way Station, Whetstone and Witch House.
If you want to submit a zine for TRIAPA, please send a 2-page zine (maximum) to spiraltowerpress@gmail.com. They invite and encourage all fans of sword and sorcery, cosmic horror, and space opera to submit.
Find out more and check out all previous editions here.
WHETSTONE:
Whetstone: The Amateur Magazine of Pulp Sword & Sorcery will be on hiatus until 2025.
The archive of all eight issues can be accessed here.
In the meantime, check out Waystation, the amateur space opera magazine they are putting out in its place. The first issue has just been released, and one can see a number of stories from members of the Sword & Sorcery community.
You can read it for free here.
The Spiral Tower crew is concentrating on their next project, the next issue of Witch House, the amateur magazine of Cosmic Horror.
SUBMISSIONS
The following markets are dedicated to or specified to accept Sword & Sorcery.
+ BFS Horizons, put out by The British Fantasy Society, is always open. 500 - 5000 Words. Remuneration is £20. Submission Guidelines.
+ Indie Bites, a non-profit fantasy anthology series put out by Silversun Books, is available on Kindle Unlimited and is looking for stories for its upcoming Spirits & Spellcasters-themed issue. Deadline: 30 September 2024. Accepts up to 7500 Words. Honorarium is £5. Submission Guidelines.
+ New Edge Sword & Sorcery is currently accepting submissions for a new story for their upcoming issues in 2025. Open till Sept 16. 4000 - 6000 words. Depending on crowdfunding success, it is 3c per word but can go up to the SFWA rate of 8c per word. Submission Guidelines.
+ Seize The Press, ”Writers, please send us more fantasy! Particularly dark sword & sorcery, historical horror, grimdark, but anything you think falls under dark fantasy and all the weird stuff you can't truly pin down.”
3 pence GBP per word, max 7500 words. Submission Guidelines.
+ Swords & Sorcery is always open. Takes 1500 - 7500 words. Payment: $10 USD. Submission Guidelines.
Thank you for reading to the end! If you like it, please share it with people you know who would dig it!
We will be back at the end of September for more Sword & Sorcery News, thank you for celebrating the first year of Just The Axe, Ma’am! —KB
Just a quick clarification: Mark Jarrell did pen some artwork for Old Moon, and it is appearing in Contra Amatores Mundi, but it's rather small! Not enough to say the novella is illustrated by any means, sadly. Thanks for the shout outs, however! Sincerely appreciated :)
-Caitlyn W.
A lot to look forward to, as ever. I'm particularly excited for the Old Moon novella.